Councillor Iain McCracken, executive member for culture, corporate services and public protection, said: “Our environmental health officers routinely carry out work to safeguard our residents from a variety of risks, including harmful bugs and illnesses.

“This is just another way of the team helping to cut the risk to our residents’ and visitors’ health and wellbeing.

“I’m delighted the coaching scheme has achieved such a successful outcome for both businesses and their customers.

“Quite often it is about taking the time to educate and explain simple things to food businesses which make a big difference and significantly cut the risk to the public.”

One business owner who benefited from the training was Julie Yang from Forest Chinese in Forest Park, who has increased her rating from two to five – “very good”.

Ms Yang said: “We were really pleased to take part in the coaching as there is always something to learn and we had some great support from Charlotte Scott and Mary Massey from environmental health.

“Our rating was much lower than it should have been because we weren’t writing things down and keeping records.

“It wasn’t about cleaning or making massive changes to our equipment or preparation.

“Instead Charlotte and Mary taught us how to make subtle changes to the way we record things and this meant when we were re-inspected we achieved the highest level.”

Pizza Bakery in Easthampstead also increased its score to five stars.

Bobby Siaz, co-owner of the business in Rectory Lane, said: “The course was very helpful as it gave us lots of extra knowledge that we are now putting into the business.

“We already knew the basics about food hygiene but this really taught us how to put everything we knew into practice.

“We’re really pleased to be rated as a grade five for our food hygiene standards, the only way is up for us now.”